title: A novel extracellular domain variant of the human integrin alpha 7 subunit generated by alternative intron splicing.
abstract: The integrin alpha 7 beta 1 laminin receptor, which is expressed on replicating myoblasts, and upregulated during myogenic differentiation, is involved in cell adhesion and communication between muscle cells and the extracellular matrix. It is a major cell-surface substrate in skeletal muscle cells for the cell-surface, argininespecific, ADP-ribosyltransferase. Both the extracellular and cytoplasmic domains of the mouse alpha 7 subunit undergo alternative splicing during development, generating differentially expressed variants with presumably unique ligand-binding and signalling properties. Here human cDNA clones isolated from a fetal heart lambda gt10 cDNA library encoded the complete sequence of the alpha 7 subunit and hybridised to a single major 4.4 kb alpha 7 subunit transcript abundantly expressed in human skeletal muscle, moderately expressed in heart, and weakly expressed in most other tissues. One clone out of four contained a novel 225-nucleotide in-frame deletion corresponding to 75 amino acids in the C-terminal region of the extracellular domain. The variant, whose expression appears to be tissue-specific, is created by alternative splicing at sites flanking an intron in the alpha 7 gene. A related mouse form was identified in P19 embryonal carcinoma cells. Deletion of the spliced region, which either contains or is in very close proximity to the major ADP-ribosylation site of the alpha 7 subunit, may serve to modulate the effects of ADP-ribosylation, or alternatively molecular associations, and receptor-ligand affinity.
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular Medicine, School of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Auckland, New Zealand.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Leung
authors.forename: S P
authors.initials: SP
authors.lastname: Lim
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Berg
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ni
authors.forename: S X
authors.initials: SX
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: G W
authors.initials: GW
authors.lastname: Krissansen
mesh_terms: D017398:Alternative Splicing; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D015703:Antigens, CD / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism; D001483:Base Sequence; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D017931:DNA Primers / Q000235:genetics; D018076:DNA, Complementary / Q000235:genetics; D005109:Extracellular Matrix / Q000737:chemistry; D014644:Genetic Variation; D006801:Humans; D039001:Integrin alpha Chains; D007438:Introns; D051379:Mice; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D011487:Protein Conformation; D012333:RNA, Messenger / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D051381:Rats; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D013045:Species Specificity; D014018:Tissue Distribution
chemical_list: D015703:Antigens, CD; D017931:DNA Primers; D018076:DNA, Complementary; D039001:Integrin alpha Chains; D012333:RNA, Messenger; C085725:integrin alpha7